Russian interference in the virtual world is not the problem

If there were no Russian "influence operations" in the virtual world, no disinformation campaign spearheaded by Russian bots and trolls, would the western world look much different today?

Robert Mueller. (c) James Berglie/Zuma Press/PA Images. All rights reserved.It's
Mueller time, again. Or rather, it's time to charge up the headline
generators about Russian interference and Putin's "master plan"
to undermine the west. In the wake of the recent indictments
of 13 Russians for attempted meddling
in the 2016 US presidential elections, the international media
produced a hail storm of articles and op-eds about Russian trolls and
bots on social media apparently capable of influencing political
outcomes and more in the west.

It
doesn't seem to matter that most of the revelations were already
known and first reported
on by Russian media.
Instead, it appears that the "Russian threat" is now more
real than ever and will impact anything from the upcoming elections
in Italy
to the mid-term elections in the United States. Even Silicon
Valley's Tech Giants are now apparently dismayed
that their products might have indeed changed the world, though not
in the way they intended. But this should not be surprise us. After
all, we are living in an era of "hybrid war" in which
social media are a "tool" for Russian bots and trolls to
succeed in what the erstwhile Soviet propaganda and intelligence
network could only have dreamed of during the Cold War.

The
techno-fetishism surrounding social media, compounded by the hours
per day millions of us spend on Twitter
or Facebook,
has managed to blur the lines between wishful thinking and reality,
between the "virtual world" and the real world beyond the
immediate vicinity of our screens. Could it not be that we are giving
social media too much credit, from inciting mass protests and even
"revolutions" to enabling hostile foreign election
meddling?

Ukraine
and the rise of the Russian threat

In
early November 2013, there was no mention of a "Russian threat"
let alone a "hybrid war" waged against the west. This
changed in a matter of months as mass protests erupted in Ukraine
following then president Viktor
Yanukovych’s
sudden decision not to sign an Association Agreement with the
European Union. The Euromaidan protests and ensuing Revolution of
Dignity were a political earthquake nobody had expected, even though
it happened in a period of increasing global protests, and it pitted
Russia and the west
against each other.

However,
geopolitical rivalry over influence in Ukraine was not new. Russia
had installed a
trade blockade against Ukraine
in the summer of 2013 in order to pressure Yanukovych to refrain from
signing the Association Agreement and consider joining the
Russian-led Eurasian Economic Union project. But back then there was
no perception of any "Russian threat". So little did that
possibility seem to be considered by western leaders and commentators
that from today's perspective it is hard to believe how complacently
and overconfidently EU politicians and US diplomats approached the
issue of Ukraine's opening to Europe.

While Ukraine and its population paid the highest price for Russia's geopolitical gambit, the west was in shock

It
was Russia's occupation and annexation of Crimea, and its subsequent
backing for the insurgency in Donbas that set off alarm bells in the
west. The idea that Moscow would react militarily to what had been a
national uprising in a neighbouring country showed that Russia and
its leadership was serious
about being seen as a Great Power
which is prepared to act in defence of what it saw as its vital
interests. While Ukraine and its population paid the highest price
for Russia's geopolitical gambit, the west was in shock. Instead of
reflecting upon their earlier miscalculations and lack of caution
regarding Ukraine and Russia, western political elites and
commentators suddenly reverted to mirroring a Russian discourse of an
aggressive and expansive west by invoking an exaggerated Russian
threat.

Western
politics as Russian conspiracies

The
fallout from the unexpected turn of events in Ukraine evolved into
what came to be coined as a "new
Cold War".
Despite the recurring alarmism of some commentators and analysts
about a Russian military threat, neither any significant escalation
of the war in Ukraine, nor any purported Russian act of aggression
against the west has materialised in the past years. Rather, the
threat of the so-called "hybrid war" has become
internalised while the Ukraine crisis has gradually been forgotten as
it no longer captures international headlines. The invisible hand of
the Kremlin is now used as an explanation ad
absurdum
for major political events that transpire in the west.

From
SYRIZA's ill-fated attempt to challenge the externally-imposed
austerity package to the outbreak
of the Catalan crisis,
from debatable electoral successes of far right parties in Europe to
the unexpected victory of Donald Trump in the US presidential
election, western commentators and politicians have been quick to
point the finger to alleged Russian interference or conspiratorial
Kremlin-linked destabilising activity as causal explanations instead
of looking at deeper societal and historical developments - even if
some of the latter are blatantly obvious and common-sensical albeit
uncomfortable explanations.

The
perceived crisis in the west in its various forms is not of Russia's
making. This is not to say that Moscow stays aloof from western
affairs. Of course Russia does not, just as it
did not in the past
(i.e. prior to the Ukraine crisis when there was no perception of a
Russian threat). But "Russian subversive activity" should
not be blown out of proportion. In countries like Ukraine that share
a border with Russia, the Kremlin can afford to rely on its military
power. In other
parts of the world,
Russia acts as a spoiler, projecting itself as a counter-weight to
the west’s hegemony, and
makes
use of its energy and financial assets or applying soft power.

None
of this really threatens the western liberal order. Nowhere has the
Kremlin thwarted the west. The threat to western liberal democracies
is internal. The
longer western elites, policy makers and commentators keep ignoring
this fact, the greater that threat will become — regardless of what
Russia does or does not do. If there was a time when western
observers rightly pointed to
how Putin's authoritarian regime bolstered
itself by seeking to blame "western interference" or
"western aggression" for problems not of the west's making,
then it is time to acknowledge that we are increasingly seeing a
similar phenomenon in the west. By reverting to a "blame-Russia
game" we are undermining
our own democracies.

The
disinformation about disinformation

In
the wake of the Ukraine crisis with the occupation of Crimea and the
outbreak of war in Donbas, we clearly saw a Russian propaganda effort
compounded by the murky realities of oligarch-owned media companies
in an environment where Russian-language media outlets have a
transnational impact. As a result, disinformation spread through both
traditional and new media outlets. Ultimately, this was a classic
effect of war and military operations, which back in 2014 also turned
the virtual world of social media into a proxy battlefield to "win
hearts and minds".

But
it is a distortion of reality to compare the Ukrainian context to the
influence of Russian disinformation, twitter bots or facebook trolls
in the west. First of all, because Russia does not have a monopoly on
disinformation. Western Europeans who opposed the war in Iraq still
remember how Anglo-American
media promoted the Bush administration's invasion plans
based on false claims of stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction.

Social media are, of course, a technological innovation that protesters use to communicate and spread information. But it does not cause people to mobilise

Secondly,
what is classified as Russian disinformation? Much of the
"disinformation" we see circulating can be easily
categorised as tabloid-like lies and gossip. In this sense, British
tabloids can claim much credit
for the Leave campaign's victory in the Brexit referendum. If only
because the tabloid press has a much larger market share and
distribution than any organised Russian disinformation campaign could
have mustered. Similarly, US cable news market leader FOX News'
years-long anti-Obama and anti-Hillary spin surely must have had more
impact on American voters than a series of Russian-made memes spread
on facebook?

In
Bulgaria, historically a country where a significant part of society
maintains sympathetic views towards Russia, research
has shown
that what is often seen as "Russian propaganda" is rather a
home-grown
phenomenon
of "pro-Russian propaganda". The fact that similar tropes
of political discourse appear as in Russia does not necessarily imply
that these tropes were deliberately infused elsewhere by some
Kremlin-ordered operation. The German Marshall Fund’s "Hamilton
68 tool for tracking Russian influence operations"
lists MAGA (Make America Great Again) as a top hashtag and FOX News
as a top url spread by an undisclosed list of Russian bots on
twitter. It suffices to note that neither MAGA nor FOX News were
conceived in Russia.

The
power of social media fallacy

The
significance of social media should not be inflated. Researchers of
protest movements still debate the veracity of so-called Twitter or Facebook "revolutions". The internet and social media has
become an important mainstay in most of our lives. Yet, research has
demonstrated that social media works against mobilisation as it leads
to "slacktivism"
while the impact of twitter and facebook on protests and their
ability to force political change has
likewise been qualified.

Social
media are, of course, a technological innovation that protesters use to
communicate and spread information. But it does not cause people to
mobilise. On the contrary, authoritarian regimes have proven quite
successful in using social media to
counter possible mobilisation.
In this light, it is doubtful whether the activity of Russian bots
and trolls or the dissemination of Russian-made memes on social media
could provide a platform to mobilise voters in any country to elect a
candidate or a party preferred by the Kremlin.

We
should thus be wary of sensationalist stories about Russian
disinformation campaigns or the activity of Russian bots and trolls
in the social media bubble. The fact that disinformation can be
spread via social media does not necessarily imply that this leads to
actions by those who are exposed to it. Does this mean Russian
interference should not be investigated? No, it should, but it needs
to be put in right perspective. As Mark Galeotti, an expert on
Russian intelligence and crime networks, poignantly
commented,
this is about crime not politics. The Mueller indictments are an
effort to prove "whether crimes were committed under US law",
and the indictments are not a conviction so "unless and until
there is proof, we should be cautious."

The
war in Ukraine and western politics are two very different realities.
Instead of amplifying hysterics about what goes on in the virtual
world, western policy makers and commentators should better focus on
the roots of the problems on which disinformation preys and through
which it resonates. To phrase this as a counter-factual question: if
there were no Russian "influence operations" in the
virtual world, no "disinformation campaign" spearheaded by
Russian bots and trolls, would the western world look much different
today?

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